"I feel we gave him that play. We just had one guy set his feet and one guy not do this. I could have thrown that ball and he would have scored. It wasn't something where he was a rocket scientist and he figured something out. We just played that as bad as possible."

This is not the first time an opponent has said that it gift-wrapped a victory for the Giants. Green Bay's Clay Matthews told Yahoo! Sports earlier this summer the Packers beat themselves during their playoff loss to the Giants last season.

Minor rant: I hate, hate, HATE when people offer the excuse of "they didn't beat us, we beat ourselves." Sure, there are occasions when teams play well but lose due to, for example, avoidable penalties or rare mental errors. But about 95% of the time, this is just a rationalization and a lame way to boost one's own self-image, essentially saying "just because they beat us doesn't mean they're better than us." When you lose, you lose. Think twice before you offer this excuse because it makes you look stupid -- especially when the game in question is an all-around beatdown like the one the Giants laid on the Packers in last year's playoffs.

Today's recommended reading: How We Know What Isn't So, by Thomas Gilovich, which addresses the bias of dissecting and analyzing failures while taking successes at face value.

Deangelo Hall has got to be one of the dumber football players out there. Fortunately for us, he cant help but speak his mind constantly. How do you defend your loss by saying, we gave them a TD? I mean, your trying to take credit away from Manning, by saying, we sucked as a defensive unit. Great. Honestly, someone need to tape this guys mouth shut.

Super Chronic:especially when the game in question is an all-around beatdown like the one the Giants laid on the Packers in last year's playoffs.

While I agree with you on the whole, I thought the comment was accurate and not in line with what Hall said. The Packers beat the Giants in New York then a few weeks later they can't seem to hold onto the ball or catch it. There were huge mental mistakes that game which made it into a beat down. It would have taken good effort to beat the then hot Giants, and I remember watching 3 Packer turnovers that were caused by sloppy play that I hadn't seen all year.

Eli Manning didn't embarass DeAngelo Hall, DeAngelo hall gave him that easy joke to make. It wasn't something where he was a rocket scientist and he figured something out. He just played that as bad as possible.

Easy to look elite when your TD gets its own segment on Sports Center and your 4th quarter INT (your 2nd of the day) is buried.

Here comes the Cowboys Fans Butthurt Brigade.

Already making excuses for next week, are we?

The Cowboys are most definitely going to lose this week. With Sean Lee out they're going to have a nightmare of a matchup problem.

My problem here is with the media. Not with Eli.

Eli's favorable coverage this week is because once the media gets a story going about a characteristic of a player, they focus so intently on it that they refuse to cover the other elements of the games.

The same goes for any QB known for "clutch" play. Like Tim Tebow, or Josh Freeman. They could go 4/35 with 4 INTs and the highlight of them throwing their one good pass on their way to a 10-9 victory is all we see... and is used to further push the idea that this person is "clutch".

Whereas if a QB not touted as "clutch", he doesn't get the same benefit. They can go 25/28 for 300 and 3 TDs and the headline is "Team wins."

Treygreen13:The same goes for any QB known for "clutch" play. Like Tim Tebow, or Josh Freeman. They could go 4/35 with 4 INTs and the highlight of them throwing their one good pass on their way to a 10-9 victory is all we see... and is used to further push the idea that this person is "clutch".

The obvious solution is to create a closer position in football for these "clutch" players.

hbk72777:mainstreet62: It takes balls to call it a gift when Eli has, what, 20+ 4th quarter comebacks in his career now? Including 2 Super Bowls?

Idiot.

27 comebacks so far. (had that penalty in the Philly game not happened, Tynes hits a chip shot and it's 28, but.....)

I'm also sick of the number of comebacks stat. While "comebacks" are good, it means you were losing. Sometimes you're leading a comeback because the other team is scoring at will, and other times you're losing because you've been sucking for the previous 51 minutes.

As a lifetime Falcon fan, I was so glad when Atlanta got rid of this clown. MEangelo Hall might be a stellar defensive player, but he is a clubhouse cancer who provides no shortage of idiotic, and douche-tastic comments. Fark this guy. Fark him right in his ear.

Treygreen13:Gunny Highway: Treygreen13: Gunny Highway: That was an elite comeback.

Easy to look elite when your TD gets its own segment on Sports Center and your 4th quarter INT (your 2nd of the day) is buried.

What current QBs are better than Eli? Not that it matters. Giants fans love the QB. They trust him when the game is on the line and he has been a major part of two SB championship teams.

Rings>Lables

I didn't say he wasn't good. I said it's easy to look good when the media highlights all your successes and completely ignores your failures.

Like throwing a ball directly to a defender on your 30 with 7 minutes left in a 1 score game.

Winning 2 SuperBowls gets the QB a lot of love from the media... only a rocket scientist can figure that one out right?

Look, if Romo would win one SuperBowl the media will turn around and praise Romo like they did Favre even if Favre is at the top (or near the top - I forget) in INTs thrown. As much as I love the Cowboys I really don't like the majority of the fans. Maybe because I'm on out of the area fan so I don't listen to the local sports media that is always negative when championships are delivered but based on the Cowboys fans I see posting on Fark there is a whole lot of people playing the victim.

I remember Tony Romo's game a few years ago against Buffalo where he threw 5 INTs but still won the game and I don't think that he got as much shiat as he got for the 5 INTs he throw against the Bears a few games ago.

Here's a newsflash: in sports, winning is all that matters and winning championships can hide a lot of faults from local and national media. Stop playing the victim and accept that Eli has had a more successful career so far than Romo. I still believe that Romo has more talent than Eli, he just can't be consistent enough to prove it and it hurts me as a Cowboys fan.

Now go ahead and label me a bad Cowboys fan because I don't have 100% faith in Romo and ingore the fact that he hasn't done much to earn it. And the problem doesn't start and end with Romo... it starts with Jerry Jones and continues with Garrett and the rest of the coaches but it's on the players as well especially the leader of the team Romo.

Treygreen13:hbk72777: mainstreet62: It takes balls to call it a gift when Eli has, what, 20+ 4th quarter comebacks in his career now? Including 2 Super Bowls?

Idiot.

27 comebacks so far. (had that penalty in the Philly game not happened, Tynes hits a chip shot and it's 28, but.....)

I'm also sick of the number of comebacks stat. While "comebacks" are good, it means you were losing. Sometimes you're leading a comeback because the other team is scoring at will, and other times you're losing because you've been sucking for the previous 51 minutes.

And sometimes, time is running out so you concentrate on winning.

Surprisingly, defenses playing #10 don't get the memo. Is it coincidence?

thecpt:Super Chronic: especially when the game in question is an all-around beatdown like the one the Giants laid on the Packers in last year's playoffs.

While I agree with you on the whole, I thought the comment was accurate and not in line with what Hall said. The Packers beat the Giants in New York then a few weeks later they can't seem to hold onto the ball or catch it. There were huge mental mistakes that game which made it into a beat down. It would have taken good effort to beat the then hot Giants, and I remember watching 3 Packer turnovers that were caused by sloppy play that I hadn't seen all year.

Even fumbles are a two-way street. I remember the Rodgers fumble, and it was a strip by a Giants defender. The one that the Giants returned close to the end zone was also caused by a hard hit after a long carry, IIRC. Same goes for dropped passes: very often, they're the result of "hearing footsteps," and you have to give credit to a physical defense.

ddam:Here's a newsflash: in sports, winning is all that matters and winning championships can hide a lot of faults from local and national media. Stop playing the victim and accept that Eli has had a more successful career so far than Romo. I still believe that Romo has more talent than Eli, he just can't be consistent enough to prove it and it hurts me as a Cowboys fan.

This has nothing to do with Tony Romo. This is about Eli Manning. I'm not going to have another thread derailed into a discussion about Tony Romo.

FreakinB:Eli can be sneaky-funny sometimes, in a very dry way. And he was surprisingly good hosting SNL. Apparently he's big on pranks too.

From one of those articles (edited for length):

Eli, sitting in the middle of the table, talked about how he hazed poor André Woodson, the rookie quarterback from Kentucky...

One day during minicamp, Eli noticed Woodson arrive at the weight room a few minutes late. Sensing a chance to mess with Woodson, Eli lit into him: "Why are you late? This isn't college anymore! You can't be late!"...

So Eli told a towel boy to clean out Woodson's locker, replacing his clothes with a note. Woodson, upon returning from lifting weights, froze. The note read: "Come see me in my office. -T.C." Woodson, thinking it came from Coughlin, looked sick. Finally, the room exploded in laughter. He'd been Eli-ed.

Treygreen13:ddam: Here's a newsflash: in sports, winning is all that matters and winning championships can hide a lot of faults from local and national media. Stop playing the victim and accept that Eli has had a more successful career so far than Romo. I still believe that Romo has more talent than Eli, he just can't be consistent enough to prove it and it hurts me as a Cowboys fan.

This has nothing to do with Tony Romo. This is about Eli Manning. I'm not going to have another thread derailed into a discussion about Tony Romo.

Let's talk about Eli than. Winning hides a lot of mistakes. He's a winning QB that has brought SuperBowls to his team. You play a professional sport to win the championship, not for stats and I'm afraid that in this Fantasy sports time that is lost on people.

A win is a win is a win. I'll take a win from Eli (or any QB) no matter what his stats are at the end of the game even if my heart will have to go through 5 INTs thrown.

Killer Cars:I admit to enjoying poking a little fun at Romo here and there too, but how in the f*ck does he come up in a thread about Eli Manning responding to a dumb remark made by someone on the Redskins?

In response to a well known Cowgirls troll asserting Eli is nothing special.

Its like the old joke, "Let's get off moms, since I just got off yours." Only with QBs.

Look, Eli had a bad game (for him) on Sunday. He threw a couple of dumb picks, he missed an open Victor Cruz on two passes that should have been easy touchdowns (one from inside the 5, one bomb) on drives where the Giants didn't end up scoring touchdowns, and on several other plays he just looked off. But at this point I trust him more or less completely, and whether or not he hit the TD pass to Cruz that wasn't going to change.

My main takeaway from that game is that Robert Griffin is TERRIFYING and I hate that the Giants will have to face him twice a year for the foreseeable future.